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Chris Vrenna interview

MMís former bandmate Chris Vrenna cites the rock starís ďvery dark lifestyleĒ as the reason for his sudden departure in 2012:

ďI donít want to say it was a nightmare, but it was a three-ring drunken circus on wheels on the time, forever. (Ö) He burned me out though. Quick version of why I quit is itís a very dark lifestyle. Thereís a lot of substance problems, the hours are insane. Itís just really intense.Ē

The part about Manson isn’t really a surprise. It’s on full display for all to see. Plus, he isn’t the first band member to mention it either. I remember Ginger Fish did an interview about 3 years back and pretty much said the same thing.

Very nice article and interview that showcases all of the great work Chris Vrenna was involved in. Thanks for sharing!

Def read the whole interview, his reflections on early NIN, the industry, teaching music and Axl Rose are cool. Also now you know where to go if you want to learn direct from Vrenna. But oh for... let's not take everything out of context and have the rest of the quotes about Manson:

(previously talking about how Trent wouldn't play the TV shows, but how he loved it and got to with Gnarls and Manson)

Gnarls Barkley was the must-see set at big festivals that year.

That was the festival show. Our first was Coachella 2006, and we played the big tent, but every single person was dressed as a character from "The Wizard of Oz." That band did every talk show, so that's when I finally got to do Leno and finally got to do "Saturday Night Live" and we did "Top of the Pops" in England, all those shows I always wanted to do growing up, since Trent wouldn't do them. Manson would do them.

I was on Letterman so many times that Paul Shaffer knew me by my face. Because I would go from Manson to Gnarls back to Manson back to Gnarls and like the third time I was there he's passing me in the hall and goes, "Didn't I just see you like two months ago? Wait, is Gnarls playing again?" I was like, "No we're back touring again with Manson because Gnarls is off." He goes, "Oh man, I was about to lose my mind."

What was most interesting about playing music with Marilyn Manson?

I've known Manson since 1990. He was doing his band Marilyn Manson and The Spooky Kids, working South Florida, writing for a fanzine. He was a great writer. He came out to the first Nine Inch Nails tour to interview the band for the local whatever. After the interview he was like, "Hey, I've got a band. Can I give you my tape?"

One day we were driving across Texas, and Texas is a long boring drive of nothing but tumbleweeds for a thousand miles and so Trent was like, "Let's listen to this guy's tape," because we were so bored with all our CDs in the van. He popped it in and we got about two songs in everybody started looking at each other like, "This is really good." And it became our favorite tape. We listened to it all the time.

And Trent reached back out to him and we kept in touch and as soon as Trent got Nothing Records as part of Interscope, he was given his label, he's like, "I know the first band I'm signing." So, I worked on those early records, I played drums on them. Ginger (Fish) played most of the drums on "Antichrist Superstar." I played drums on maybe half of it.

"Beautiful People" is Ginger and I playing drums together - the diggidi dun diggidi dun dun. We set up two kits, like two sets of toms at the same time and we double mic-ed the whole thing and then we played it and we set up another set of toms and we'd both play, and we layered ourselves.

The only reason I ended up in the band was Ginger got hurt. They were playing on a TV show, and there was some sort of big set piece, Ginger did a Ginger and fell off. I get a phone call from Manson's manager and I was in Perth, Australia with Gnarls Barkley and it was the last show of the tour, after 12 months straight, no break, just around the world, around the world, around the world. My phone rings and it was Manson's manager. "Hey man, so what are you up to?"

It was crazy. I don't want to say it was a nightmare, but it was a three-ring drunken circus on wheels on the time, forever. And after Ginger got healthy and came back, then Pogo (aka Madonna Wayne Gacy, aka Stephen Bier) the keyboard player quit, so I moved over from drums to keyboards. And I ended up being a full-time member of that band for like seven and a half years, somewhere in there.

He burned me out though. Quick version of why I quit is it's a very dark lifestyle. There's a lot of substance problems, the hours are insane. It's just really intense. It's as crazy as everything you've ever read and everything you've ever heard.

What's the most debauched thing you witnessed during your time with Manson?

If I could even come up with it, I probably wouldn't even tell you because one thing about this stuff, there's kind of a code of honor where you don't want to, because it would involve perhaps other people. Mine were always with other people. I was always the one that was like, "You can't do that. Are really going to do that? Oh my God, you're doing that." And I'm the one in the corner laughing. I witnessed a whole lot of horrifically bizarre stuff.

What's the most normal thing about Marilyn Manson?

That he likes comedy movies, like "Land of the Lost" with Danny McBride, that was a movie we watched a lot. Even more normal than that, he really enjoyed like nice steak dinners. When we were on-tour we'd go out and have these incredibly awesome multicourse dinners on nights off and stuff like that. He just likes to have a nice meal and hang out. Was kind of a homebody, loved movies and TV. His DVD collection was ridiculous. Thousands of DVDs.

And:

What's something about Axl Rose as a day-to-day guy most people don't know?

Just really a soft-spoken guy, very knowledgeable about music and art and film and just would like to sit around and talk about film and art, the way I talk about TV. Same kind of talk. But very soft spoken. He's actually not that crazy. I think maybe he outgrew it too, like we're all young and nuts at one time and then you eventually get older. Now Guns N' Roses goes on on-time, every time. People change.

That's one thing about everybody you've asked me about. People grow up and people's tastes change. I don't listen to the same music now I listened to when I was 16. I don't like the same kind of movies when I was 22. Trent's married and has four kids. He scores movies.

The problem becomes this weird thing where fans don't want you to ever change what you were. They don't want Manson to be anything besides "Beautiful People," "Antichrist Superstar" Manson. Even though Manson's going to be 50 next year. No one wants to see 50-year-old Manson in the same fish nets and bustier thing and jock strap. Nobody wants to see that, so let him wear a suit and a tie because he looks good in a suit in a tie. Let him not wear as much goofy makeup like he used to wear on "Mechanical Animals." You can't please anybody. A few people get lucky and can.